Update: 6:25 a.m. EST. Reports now say that the suspected bomber was killed in the shooting, and London police have surrounded a mosque in East London after an alleged bomb threat. The cynic in me wonders if the Imam of the mosque will come out and say “this bomb threat is a hoax. We just did a quick inventory, and all our bombs inside are accounted for.”

Update: 6:30 a.m. EST. It is being confirmed that British police have shoot-to-kill orders if they believe that a bombing suspect is about to detonate his bomb. Unconfirmed reports say that the suspect was a heavily-dressed man of apparently Asian descent who was running on to a crowded train.

Update: 6:45 a.m. EST. ITV is reporting that the man was NOT carrying a backpack, but was apparently covered in heavy clothing. He was running to get on a train when he tripped and fell and was set upon by police. Scotland Yard is confirming that he is dead.

Update: 7:00 a.m. A quick recap: Apparently around 10:00 a.m. London time (5:00 a.m. EST), an Asian man wearing a heavy, quilted jacket but NOT carrying a backback or rucksack jumped the ticket turnstile at the Stockwell subway station and ran for a train. Police chased him on to the train, where he tripped or was tackled. In the ensuing struggle, he was shot between three and six times and was killed.

Meantime, an East London mosque has been surrounded by armed police, among reports of a bomb threat. There have been no further developments on that story.

I’m going to leave this post at the top of the page for a while, and hope that Kevin and/or Paul can continue the updates or start a new thread after I leave for work.

This terrorist is the one accused of financing many terrorist projects. Yet he has just been freed this week with not a peep from the news media. Germany let him go free because its constitution protects criminals from a European Court arrest warrant. What a joke.

The real reason behind it all: He, like many other of these vile criminals, use the laws of the countries they wish to destroy for their own benefit.

” The cynic in me wonders if the Imam of the mosque will come out and say ‘this bomb threat is a hoax. We just did a quick inventory, and all our bombs inside are accounted for.’ ”

As does mine.

PalmateerJuly 22, 2005

Regarding the guy who was shot dead:

“A senior police official told CNN the man was being followed in connection with the investigation. The man has not been formally identified, the official said, and it is not clear if he was one of the four suspected bombers police have identified from closed circuit television images.”

PalmateerJuly 22, 2005

Here’s more from Sky News:

AIM WAS TO ARREST MAN

Specialist officers had been tailing the man shot at Stockwell Tube station from his home, says Sky News Crime Correspondent Martin Brunt.

Police believed the Asian man was responsible for an attempted attack on the nearby Oval Tube on Thursday and had set up surveillance on him.

Brunt said officers had followed the man from his home and that the initial plan was to arrest him.

But from his home to Stockwell Tube, events overtook police and marksmen were forced to shoot.

Despite temperatures of around 22C (72F), officers and witnesses said the man was wearing a heavy coat under which it was feared may have been a bomb.

Brunt said: “Intelligence officers had suggested he was the bomber from Thursday.

“Officers were confronted with the very real possibility that this man did have a bomb.”

Initial examinations though, said Brunt, did not discover any explosives on the suspect.